And now, a picture post!  Here's some of my life since the beginning of the semester:


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Somewhat belatedly, here’s a summertime picture post - of eastern MA, mostly, with some North Carolina thrown in. One of the best summers on record, and that’s saying something.


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I have a new favorite place in Boston… okay, a new contender for the top 5, at least. Bova's Bakery. It's in North End - one of several bakeries there, and not the most popular by any means. There are literally lines out the door and blocking other entranceways from the two major pastry places on Hanover St. If I have but one scrap of Bostonian ( Read more... )

A couple of you have heard my lament that I couldn't find the grave of Emerson's first wife Ellen - this is the woman he removed from her grave a year and two months after her death, so that he could... behold her, or have an unmediated sensory experience of her decay or whatever it was. I've become attached to this woman who wrote poetry and died ( Read more... )

I've been having fun seeing the folks here at UMass again, after a month and more away from some of them.  My favorite of them, photographer Jon, sort of smiled and waved in this quiet way he has when I caught his eye across a meeting this morning.  And that was that - it was quite literally all we needed.  Lots of people gesticulate and say " ( Read more... )

A few weeks ago I climbed Mount Misery, here in Lincoln. Thoreau refers to it on occasion, and he’s particularly fond of its leaves, which were apparently mostly yellow in his day. He wrote on August 23rd, 1853:
“Looking down the river valley now from Mt. Misery, an hour before sundown, I am struck with nothing so much as the autumnal coolness of ( Read more... )

Sam, at work, is charming. Photographer. I forgave him a long time ago for his self-satisfaction with his own laid backness. He’s twenty-three and a May graduate, but could pass as a high schooler. And I mean, he really really could. He likes to explore and says things that actually matter. Not that he tries to be deep or profound- he just ( Read more... )

“So shortly I settled it with myself and stood to watch the approaching flames. It was a glorious spectacle, and I was the only one there to enjoy it.”

Last Friday I went to Fairhaven Bay - the north shore to be exact. Please believe it took some persistence and stamina to get there- when I copied down the trails, I copied two stemming from the ( Read more... )

So I'm looking after this cat while my host family is gone (Rachel, don't mention their leaving to the parental units).  And it's been pretty okay- it's come when I call it at night, and been really friendly because I'm all it's got.  Similarly, it's been nice having a thing around that's supposed to make sound and can hear and things like that... ( Read more... )

So, as I mentioned earlier, I got lost a fair bit when I first got here. Exactly one month after I nearly exploded having to use the bathroom north of Walden in the woods, I got lost in Lincoln. And not simply "lost/have to pee"... it was, even more discouragingly, lost/can’t can't can't get home.

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